People

Rex Nielson, Director of the Humanities Center

Rex P. Nielson is Professor of Spanish and Portuguese and Director of the BYU Humanities Center. His interests include literary and cultural studies, especially in relation to the Portuguese-speaking world. He has taught all levels of Portuguese language as well as a variety of courses on Luso-Afro-Brazilian literature and culture, as well as interdisciplinary courses for Latin American Studies, Africana Studies, Global Women’s Studies, and the BYU Honors Program. His research interests focus on (1) ecocriticism and environmental ethics in Brazil and the global south, (2) race and gender in Luso-Brazilian culture, (3) language and literature pedagogy, and (4) translation studies. He has served in various professional organizations, including as the President of the American Portuguese Studies Association (APSA) (2019–2020). Rex and his wife, Natalie, an adjunct professor in the Department of Comparative Arts and Letters, live in Provo and are the proud parents of five children.

Brooke Browne, Assistant Director of the Humanities Center

Brooke Browne originally joined the BYU Humanities Center in 2015, and she is excited to be back as the Assistant Director after a 2-year hiatus. She loved growing up at the base of the mountain in Mapleton where she now lives next door to her childhood home. She graduated from BYU with a BS in Home and Family Life and a minor in Music in 2003. She and her husband Jeremy (Research Professor, Office of Digital Humanities) are the parents of 4 boys, with only 17-year-old twins at home. When she’s not dreaming of her favorite place (Paris), Brooke enjoys playing piano, baking, watching K-Drama, and cheering on the Cougars.

Rob Colson, Marshall Professorship and Three-Year Faculty Fellow (2026 – 2029)

Robert Colson received his PhD in English from the University of California, Irvine and is an associate professor of Interdisciplinary Humanities at BYU. His research interests include modern and contemporary anglophone fiction, particularly modernist and postcolonial writers such as James Joyce, Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o, Virginia Woolf, and Salman Rushdie. His work has appeared in venues such as James Joyce Quarterly, ARIEL, Research in African Literatures, and ISLE. He is currently working on a monograph about nationalism and on articles about Future Library and Rushdie’s Quichotte.

Brian Croxall, Three-Year Faculty Fellow (2024 – 2027)

Brian Croxall is Associate Research Professor of Digital Humanities at Brigham Young University. His research interests include American and English literatures from the nineteenth century to the present; game, trauma, and media studies (not all together!); comic strips, especially Peanuts; and pedagogy. With Diane K. Jakacki, he is the co-editor of What We Teach When We Teach DH (2023), from the University of Minnesota Press. He is also the co-editor, with Rachel A. Bowser, of Like Clockwork: Steampunk Pasts, Presents, and Futures (2016, Minnesota). He has served in various national and international professional organizations, including as a member of both the Executive Council and Program Committee of the Modern Language Association.

Sharon Harris, Three-Year Faculty Fellow (2026 – 2029)

Sharon [or Dr. Harris] studies the intersections of literature and music in the early modern period and holds degrees in music, humanities, and English literature. She has published in various journals and collections and has been the recipient of various fellowships, including from the Newberry and Huntington libraries. Sharon’s current research examines the uses and reappropriations of English masques and their music across the seventeenth century. She has also published and presented on theological readings of the Book of Mormon and is the author of Enos, Jarom, Omni: A Brief Theological Introduction. Sharon and her husband are the parents of two incredibly delightful boys.

Katya Jordan, Three-Year Faculty Fellow (2026 – 2029)

Dr. Katya Jordan teaches Russian language and literature in the Department of German and Russian. Her research focuses on Russian journalism of the late nineteenth century, with particular emphasis on the life and political writings of Mme. Olga Novikoff and the literary journalism of Fyodor Dostoevsky. She earned her Ph.D. in Slavic Languages and Literatures from the University of Virginia.

James Swensen, Three-Year Faculty Fellow (2024-2027)

James Swensen is professor of art history and the history of photography at Brigham Young University. He completed his Ph.D. at the University of Arizona in 2009. His research interests include American photography, the art and photography of the American West, and the representation of pilgrimage. His work has appeared in History of Photography, TransAtlantica: Revue d’Études Américaines, American Indian Quarterly, and The European Journal of American Culture, among others. He is also the author of two monographs: Picturing Migrants: The Grapes of Wrath and New Deal Documentary Photography (University of Oklahoma Press, 2015), and In a Rugged Land: Ansel Adams, Dorothea Lange, and the Three Mormon Towns Collaboration, 1953-1954 (University of Utah Press, 2018), which won the Juanita Brooks Best Book Award from the Utah Historical Society in 2019. He also co-authored (with Farina King and Mike Taylor) Returning Home: Diné Creative Works from the Intermountain Indian School, published by the University of Arizona Press in 2021.

David Laraway, Scheuber and Veinz and Three-Year Faculty Fellow (2026 – 2029)

David Laraway is a professor in the Department of Spanish and Portuguese. He received his PhD in Romance Studies (Hispanic Literature) from Cornell University in 1998. In addition to Árbol de imágenes: nueva historia de la poesía hispanoamericana (with Merlin H. Forster), he is the author of numerous articles and book chapters on a wide range of topics in Hispanic Literature and Culture, from modernista poetry to contemporary Basque narrative to Chilean cyberpunk. In 2015, he completed a second PhD in Philosophy, Art, and Social Thought at the European Graduate School (EGS) in Saas-Fee, Switzerland, where he took seminars from Simon Critchley, Slavoj Zizek, Michael Hardt, and Lev Manovich, among others. In 2018, he published American Idiots: Outsider Music, Outsider Art, and the Philosophy of Incompetence (New York: Atropos). In 2020, he published Borges and Black Mirror (New York: Palgrave-Macmillan). He served as the chair of the Department of Spanish and Portuguese from 2011–17 and of the Department of Philosophy from 2019–22.

Jon Balzotti, One-Year Faculty Fellow

Jon Balzotti is an Associate Professor of English at Brigham Young University whose research examines how writers develop professional judgment in authentic workplace settings. Drawing on rhetoric and experiential learning, his scholarship explores how students learn to interpret complex situations and negotiate competing constraints while making sound decisions under conditions of uncertainty. His recent work also investigates how artificial intelligence is reshaping professional communication and writing instruction, with particular attention to preparing students for AI-mediated workplaces.

He is the creator of Playable Case Studies, immersive workplace simulations that place students in realistic professional environments where they must navigate the rhetorical challenges of workplace communication. His research argues that professional writing is best understood as situated rhetorical action and investigates how authentic workplace experiences can help students develop transferable writing practices. His work has been supported by the National Science Foundation, the U.S. Department of Energy, Pearson Education, and Brigham Young University.

Balzotti’s scholarship has appeared in Technical Communication Quarterly, IEEE Transactions on Professional Communication, Business and Professional Communication Quarterly, The WAC Journal, The International Journal of Human–Computer Interaction, and other venues. He is currently writing a book that proposes a framework for teaching situated writing in the age of artificial intelligence.

At Brigham Young University, Balzotti serves as the Professional Writing and Rhetoric Program Coordinator, College Experiential Learning Coordinator, and Managing Editor of Experience Journal. He teaches courses in rhetoric, professional writing, technical communication, and user experience, where he continues to explore how immersive learning environments can bridge the gap between classroom writing and professional practice.

Brett McInelly, One-Year Faculty Fellow

Brett C. McInelly earned his PhD in English literature at the University of Cincinnati in 2000, at which time he joined the English department at BYU. Shortly after his hire, he became interested in the literary reception of Methodism in eighteenth-century Britain and his research has culminated in more than a dozen articles and two monographs, Textual Warfare and the Making of Methodism (Oxford UP, 2014) and Methodism and the Rise of Popular Literary Criticism: Reviewing the Revival (Routledge, 2023). His current project, Performing Methodism and the Eighteenth-Century British Stage (forthcoming, Liverpool UP), examines Methodism’s complex and contested relationship with the theater. He  also serves as the series editor for Bloomsbury’s Cultural History of Religion and has recently begun work on a new project entitled “Read All About It!” Methodism in the Eighteenth-Century British Newspaper.

Nicole Apaza, Humanities Center Social Media Intern

Nicole Apaza is a junior at Brigham Young University studying Psychology. Originally from Puno, Peru, she is especially interested in people, culture, storytelling, and the ways communication can create meaningful connections across communities. She enjoys creative work and has experience creating social media content and working with students at BYU. Outside of school and work, Nicole loves traveling, trying new things, learning about different cultures, and finding new ways to tell a good story. She is excited to bring her creativity and perspective to the BYU Humanities Center as its Social Media Intern.

Sawyer Wood, Humanities Center Intern

Rachel Gammon, Eliza R. Snow Undergraduate Fellow

Rachel has majors in Arabic and Middle East Studies and a propensity for learning languages, which so far include Arabic, Khmer, and Mandarin. She reads at least six books at a time; her current desk stack features Orientalism (Edward Said), Gathering Moss (Robin Wall Kimmerer), From Here to Eternity (Caitlin Doughty), Devotions (Mary Oliver), House of Many Ways (Diana Wynne Jones), and السبيليات (Ismail Fahd Ismail). When not engaged in academic pursuits, she can be found in the mountains, crocheting, or working through a set of Debussy pieces on the piano. She has scary amounts of knowledge about corn plants, courtesy of a high school job that kept her in the fields forty hours a week for five summers, but does not plan to continue this career trajectory into her adult life, hoping instead to pursue a PhD in Arabic Linguistics.

Brendan Murphy, Eliza R. Snow Undergraduate Fellow

Brendan Murphy is a senior from Springville, Utah majoring in Philosophy and English and minoring in Scandinavian Studies and Logic. Brendan plans to attend graduate school, studying poetics and phenomenology. He also has interests in jurisprudence, moral psychology, and the philosophy of sport. Brendan was an intern at the UK Parliament working in religious freedom advocacy and genocide prevention. He has presented at several conferences on subjects in law, philosophy, and poetics. Brendan has published in A Priori, Brown’s undergraduate philosophy journal. He has served as the editor-in-chief for BYU’s undergraduate philosophy and literary criticism journals. In his free time, Brendan enjoys hiking, skiing, playing and watching sports, and practicing languages.

Henry Purser, Eliza R. Snow Undergraduate Fellow

Henry is a senior majoring in English and minoring in philosophy and American studies. His research interests include American modernist poetry, media theory, and legal studies. And in his free time, he likes to read, spend time outside, and watch movies.

Cannon Sharp, Eliza R. Snow Undergraduate Fellow

Cannon Sharp is a senior studying Comparative Literature with minors in Portuguese and German. Raised on a farm in rural Emery County, Utah, he works on campus as a peer tutor at the Research & Writing Center. His academic interests include Central European modernism, the Viennese fin-de-siècle, and the Latin American Boom, along with a focus on the medical humanities that informs his preparation for medical school. Outside of school, he is an enthusiastic sportsman and outdoorsman who loves skiing, hiking, tennis, baseball, and football.

Jorja Webb, Eliza R. Snow Undergraduate Fellow

Jorja grew up in Northern California; currently a senior, she is majoring in English and minoring in editing. She has edited an article for the Prelaw Review, and her writing has been published through BYU’s Global Religious Experience Seminar and in the linguistics student journal Schwa. Jorja loves her job as a writing consultant at the Research and Writing Center. When she’s not reading or writing, Jorja is either cooking, travelling, or traversing the streets of Provo (whether walking or running). After graduation, Jorja plans to attend law school to further her involvement in child advocacy and community peace.

Sophie West, Eliza R. Snow Undergraduate Fellow

Sophie is a senior majoring in English with a minor in Global Women’s Studies. She is Co-Editor in Chief of BYU’s Undergraduate Literary Criticism Journal, Criterion, a tutor at BYU’s Research and Writing Center, and an undergraduate research fellow for BYU’s Redd Center for Western Studies. Sophie is interested in 19th century American women’s literature, the intersection of faith and the humanities, and the personal essay form. She has recently presented research at the National Undergraduate Research and Literature conferences and at BYU’s English Symposium. In her free time, Sophie enjoys blogging, swimming, distance running, and playing guitar.

Nils Young, Eliza R. Snow Undergraduate Fellow

Nils Young is a German major from Vermont with plans to attend medical school and become a physician. He is passionate about the importance of the humanities in medicine and health care, especially the ways in which studying language and culture can help physicians provide more compassionate care to patients. Nils grew up with three little sisters and his dog, Blueberry. He spends his time outside of school skiing, running, reading, and spending time with friends.